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<h1><a name="bib"></a>What is BibTeX?</h1>

  <p>The traditional way to do the bibliography is
  to include the bibliography entries directly into
  the document, which is a sure but not so robust way
  to handle the matter.</p>

  <p>BibTeX is an "extension" to LaTeX for handling
  bibliographic citations in a more elegant way. The
  idea is to collect a database of bibliographic
  citations, which can be used with multiple (if not all)
  documents produced &mdash; instead of copying the same citations
  over and over again. BibTeX provides the way to create
  such a database. As an additional bonus, BibTeX allows
  different presentation formats (and new ones can be created)
  for the bibliography, so it is possible to change 
  the look of the bibliography by just by changing
  parameters (and not rewriting the entries manually).</p> 

  
  <h2>Using this BibTeX stuff sounds complicated...</h2>
  
  <p>... but luckily it is not.   
  <ol>
    <li>Create a BibTeX file, like "mybib.bib"</li>
    <li>Add few entries into it. For example, use 
      BibTeX <a href="templates.html">templates</a>,
	  i.e. hit <code>ctrl + space</code> (or what content 
      assist is bound to on your system) while editing the .bib file.
    </li>
    <li>Save the BibTeX file and include it into
      the document by using the commands
      <i>\bibliographystyle{alpha}</i> (sets the style)
      <i>\bibliography{mybib}</i> (inputs the bibliography;
      the filename extension .bib must be omitted).
    </li>
    <li>Save the document; now TeXlipse can show you
      those bibliography entries (and the full information of
      that reference in the .bib file): just type 
      <a name="cite">"\cite{"</a>
      and hit <code>ctrl + space</code> (or wait for automatics to kick in).
      As there are many different citation packages available
      (instead of the default <i>\cite{}</i>), 
      any "\*cite*{" string can be used for this purpose.
      Also note that you can enter the beginning of the 
      citation to shorten the list of displayed citations.
    </li>
  </ol>
  </p>
  
  <h2>Alrighty, should I know something else?</h2>
  
  <p>Few notes: first, only those bibliography entries
  show up in the document which are really cited
  (so using .bib file of thousand entries does not
  result in a very large bibliography). To include
  bibliography entries that are not referred to, use
  <i>\nocite{key}</i> command within the document;
  the key can be either a key of an entry or * for including
  all entries.</p>
  
  <p>Second, you can use multiple .bib files:
  just type them all into the
  <i>\bibliography{}</i> command and separate them with commas
  (be sure not to put any whitespace surrounding the commas).</p>

  <p>Third, you can (and should) cite multiple
  citations with one <i>\cite{}</i> command &mdash; separate
  the citations with a comma. Note that for the content assist
  to work there must not be any whitespaces. An example:
  
  <ul>
    <li><code>ctrl + space</code> gives a list of of citations after
      "\cite{citation1,citation2,&lt;CURSOR&gt;"
    </li>
    <li>but <code>ctrl + space</code> gives nothing after
      "\cite{citation1, citation2,&lt;CURSOR&gt;"
    </li>
  </ul>
  </p>

  <h2>Hey &mdash; I use <i>\begin{thebibliography}</i> in my LaTeX file, and the citation
    completitions do not work!</h2>
    
  <p>That is correct, we chose not to support the <i>thebibliography</i> environment
    simply because we find the BibTeX to be a lot better for handling bibliography.</p>

  <p>Even if you really need to put everything in to the same file (for instance the
    journal to which you are submitting you paper really wants the submissions
    be just a single file),
    we still recommend that you use BibTeX. BibTeX generates the bibliographic entries
    into .bbl file, and you can manually insert that file into you document
    just before you submit it.</p>
    
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